Peter Tosh Live Re-Up!

Back by popular demand is Peter Tosh’s performance at The Bayou, Washington, DC, March 14, 1979.

The date is March 14, 1979 and Peter Tosh is in Washington, DC to play The Bayou.  The afternoon before the show, he enters WHFS studios for an interview and short performance.

This show, recorded for the King Biscuit Flower Hour in 1979, was during the tour promoting Tosh’s hit album, Don’t Look Back. Tosh had fallen under the spotlight of the Glimmer Twins, Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, who collaborated with Tosh and produced the critically and commercially acclaimed LP. Jagger sang a duet with Tosh on the title track, a remake of an old Temptations song that Tosh actually first recorded with The Wailers. The Stones had a lot to do with introducing Tosh to the world by putting him on their tour as the opening act.

Although the association with Jagger and Richards gave Tosh considerable exposure, Tosh would later scorn Jagger and Richards for not continuing their support and for returning back to their primary duties as Rolling Stone members, and Tosh’s subsequent albums on the Stones label did not get the same level of support. By the early 80s, Tosh had become a cult reggae artist in the US, but remained a superstar in his native Jamaica and in Europe.

Highlights of this show include a blistering Wailers’ standard “400 Years,” which is grouped with “The Stepping Razor” to make for a powerful opening segment. Tosh offers a fifteen minute medley of “Soon Come / I’m the Toughest /Bush Doctor,” closing with a killer version of “Don’t Look Back (You’ve Gotta Walk)” and a nearly twelve-minute rendition of his classic pro-pot song “Legalize It.”

Wolfgang’s Vault offers a nice presentation and review of the Bayou performance, though incomplete.

Also, a review of the show from the Baltimore Sun (thanks Fred at http://voiceofthesufferers.fr for the article).

Here is a review of the show by Tom Basham that was published in the March 23, 1979 issue of the Washington Post.